2 ms·

Russia has a motivation to kill the pipelines now, to increase gas prices now, as NS1 & NS2 are NOT the only paths to get gas to the EU. Since they are already

by toss1 4y ago

Russia has a motivation to kill the pipelines now, to increase gas prices now, as NS1 & NS2 are NOT the only paths to get gas to the EU. Since they are already down for "maintenance" (and we actually know some maintenance is needed), it would be a good tactical move to kill the possibility of NS1 & NS2 delivering gas, increase focus on the crisis now, and hope that this scares the EU into stopping supporting Ukraine. Norway also reported drone sightings on their oil & gas fields. It would be very tactical for Putin to start taking out all EU supplies as much as practical, since he obviously cannot win on the battlefield. My feeling is that this will backfire in the current information environment, in the short term only enraging the victims by making clear who is the enemy creating the misery, and in the long term giving politicians justification to say that Russia is an unreliable supplier. It can only work as long as there is a mystery about who is taking out supplies, and if any other facility than Russia's own are taken out, everyone knows that the culprit is Russia. Also, Russia is so good at this that they have a word for it: "provokatsiya" or "provocation", 'A political event staged by an intelligence service on behalf of its government in order to accomplish some political goal. '.[1] Russia also has extensive submarine capabilities and ports on the Baltic Sea. [2] Means, motive, opportunity. That's my bet right now, given limited open source information. [0] https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Norway-Investigates-Mysterious-Drone-Sightings-Near-Offshore-Oil-Gas-Fields.html https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Norway-In... [1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/provokatsiya https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/provokatsiya [2] https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Russian-Ports-in-the-Baltic-Sea_fig7_291312846 https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Russian-Ports-in-the-Bal...

rad_gruchalski 4y ago
> and hope that this scares the EU into stopping supporting Ukraine This absolutely doesn’t make sense. If the pipeline is gone, EU does not have any incentive to settle with Russia. Like, “whatever”, no pipe, we send tanks to Ukraine because you have nothing to offer to us anymore.
- toss1 4y ago
  You are massively missing the facts that: 1) there are multiple OTHER pipelines from Russia to the EU, and NatGas can be shipped by sea (as is now being done from the US); NS1 was not the only route, and NS2 was barely online, and already Germany was heavily dependent on Russian supplies. So it would still be easy to make a settlement with Russia to get more NatGas and oil if the EU wanted. 2) Russia has a LONG history of creating non-military disruption in target countries to gain advantage. Simple disruption of the political situation in the EU is very advantageous to Russia, they would hope it causes at the very least a diversion of funds and attention from supporting Ukraine to dealing with domestic unrest. 3) A new pipeline from Norway was opened literally the same day. This sends a message: "Nice pipeline you have there, it'd be a shame if anything happened to it.". This further creates uncertainty and stress in the EU. All of these benefit Russia and it's Ukraine genocide efforts directly and significantly. That said, there is definitely the possibility that it could also backfire, and strengthen the will of the EU to avoid Russia as a completely unreliable and exploitative supplier, and as you say, reply with "FU, we're sending more tanks to Ukraine". I sincerely hope so.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- toss1 4y ago
  another key hint: The gas is apparently still flowing out of the pipes at pressure - this can happen only if Russia is still pumping, for which the only purpose would be to spend money to create an environmental disaster - another distraction/disruption.
  - rad_gruchalski 4y ago
    No, the gas is flowing out of the pipeline because the pipeline wasn't empty. Apparently, it will take until Sunday for the pipeline to empty.

by toss1 4y ago

rad_gruchalski 4y ago

> and hope that this scares the EU into stopping supporting Ukraine This absolutely doesn’t make sense. If the pipeline is gone, EU does not have any incentive to settle with Russia. Like, “whatever”, no pipe, we send tanks to Ukraine because you have nothing to offer to us anymore.

toss1 4y ago
You are massively missing the facts that: 1) there are multiple OTHER pipelines from Russia to the EU, and NatGas can be shipped by sea (as is now being done from the US); NS1 was not the only route, and NS2 was barely online, and already Germany was heavily dependent on Russian supplies. So it would still be easy to make a settlement with Russia to get more NatGas and oil if the EU wanted. 2) Russia has a LONG history of creating non-military disruption in target countries to gain advantage. Simple disruption of the political situation in the EU is very advantageous to Russia, they would hope it causes at the very least a diversion of funds and attention from supporting Ukraine to dealing with domestic unrest. 3) A new pipeline from Norway was opened literally the same day. This sends a message: "Nice pipeline you have there, it'd be a shame if anything happened to it.". This further creates uncertainty and stress in the EU. All of these benefit Russia and it's Ukraine genocide efforts directly and significantly. That said, there is definitely the possibility that it could also backfire, and strengthen the will of the EU to avoid Russia as a completely unreliable and exploitative supplier, and as you say, reply with "FU, we're sending more tanks to Ukraine". I sincerely hope so.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
toss1 4y ago
another key hint: The gas is apparently still flowing out of the pipes at pressure - this can happen only if Russia is still pumping, for which the only purpose would be to spend money to create an environmental disaster - another distraction/disruption.
- rad_gruchalski 4y ago
  No, the gas is flowing out of the pipeline because the pipeline wasn't empty. Apparently, it will take until Sunday for the pipeline to empty.